we're gonna be uh... looking at acts chapter eight today and uh... you may be wondering why we're looking at the whole chapter because there's clearly several different stories going on i will say that for me this is one of the hardest parts of getting ready to preach is deciding how much to preach on what is the unit what is the section preach on and as you are i'm sure are aware as i've You've probably heard many different sermons or different sections from even this chapter. There's different ways to divide it up. One of the things that I noticed as I was reading through and looking for a change, though, was that there's a consistent emphasis on the way that the Christians were preaching the gospel throughout this section. And I thought it was helpful to focus on that and to look at how God is spreading the gospel as he empowers his mission for the church in different ways through different stories. And so we're actually going to look at the whole chapter to see how God is doing that and look at several different stories to see the different things that God is using to accomplish his mission in the church. I don't know if you all have noticed, as you drive around, there's a number of cars that have this little T on the front of them. It stands for Tesla. Maybe you've seen those cars before. I'm not too much of a car person, but I like technology, and Teslas are kind of a mix of being an interesting car and also interesting from a technological perspective. But I was reading some information this week about that car company specifically, and it's interesting how they've become so prevalent, because A few years ago, I think they started around the year 2011 or so, so they haven't been around for a long time, but suddenly you start to see their cars, and they've entered a market that was already flooded with a lot of different brands of vehicle. And they have another uniqueness, and that is that all of their cars are electric. And that is completely different from what was done in the past, for the most part, in the car manufacturing industry. But one of the things that is unique to Tesla vehicles is that when they decided that they wanted people to buy these and to feel comfortable purchasing them, one of the difficulties with electric cars is the battery. You have to charge it up. And it's not like a car that runs on gas, where you just fill it up with more gas. So there's all kinds of different ways that they've tried to work through this problem. But for Tesla, what they decided was the way that they would convince people to buy their vehicles wasn't just by making the cars nice and making people want to buy them, but they were going to create a network of power charging stations so that anyone who purchases a car from Tesla can be confident no matter where I go, for the most part, I will be able to charge up this vehicle and continue on my journey. And so they've built this network of charging stations. And as far as electric cars go, Tesla has taken the market by a vast majority in being able to do that. And it's because people know that they will have the power that they need to get to their destination. And when we think about the way that God has called us to share the gospel with others, God has not left us to do that on our own, stranded, wondering if we're going to have the power to do it sometimes, and other times we won't. God has provided the power at any point that we need to be able to preach the gospel, and he uses different things in our lives, and he uses different things that he has given us in order to be able to share the gospel. And so as we look at Acts chapter 8, let's look at the ways that God gives us the ability to share the gospel as he works, as he empowers that spreading of the gospel in Acts 8. We can see things in our own lives that God is doing to give us the ability to fulfill his mission. We are not dependent on ourselves. It's not up to us. God has connected us to the power source that we need, Himself, and He's using those things to give us the ability to share the Gospel if we depend on Him. If we try to do it on our own, we're going to fail. And so let's look at how He does that. Beginning in the beginning of chapter 8, we're a little bit of a conclusion from the time before. we see that Saul is approving of the execution of Stephen. So a man here is working to accomplish what he thinks is right. So he approves of the execution of Stephen. And then it continues by saying, there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions, this is really significant, of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. Think about Acts 1-8. Jesus said that he would send his disciples, Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth. And by the time we get to the end of chapter 8, we're going to see that that is moving that direction. That's happening. Now, when I first read that, I thought for a second, well, Is this persecution something that God is sending because these people are not doing what he wants them to do? They're not sharing the gospel as they should in the city of Jerusalem. So maybe something along the lines of, we often talk about the story of the Tower of Babel, and we say, well, the people weren't scattering around the earth like God told them to, so he confused their languages and forced them to do it. But I think based on the fact that the leaders in Jerusalem and Saul were so adamant about persecuting these people and dragging them out of their homes, they must have been sharing the gospel and making a big impact in the community that they were in. So I don't think this is a punishment that God is sending to them to make them spread the gospel. I think this is God's work to actually help them to do it. It's not a punishment or a consequence of something done wrong, but rather God working through circumstances, God empowering his mission through circumstances to help them spread the gospel. And then we see in verse 2 it says that, So as we see what happens when Stephen dies, you think, well this is destructive for the church, this is going to be damaging to them. But instead of that, Stephen's death is actually working the spread of the gospel. So these devout godly men that are mentioned, There's a possibility that those aren't necessarily Christians, they could be Jews in the city, but either way these people recognize that Stephen was not guilty in the sense that he should have been stoned to death. They recognize that something improper was done. This was not the way that they were supposed to handle these kinds of situations. And so whether these are Christian men who recognize that this was wrong, or whether these were Jewish men The reason that they are burying him appropriately is because they recognize something wrong was done here. A person who was executed was not supposed to have this kind of burial. And so it was clear to them that something wrong was done. So God is working to help people see the wrong that was done and that he's going to accomplish his plan. He's going to allow the spread of the gospel, even in the midst of a situation that looks really bad. But it's not just that Stephen's death spreads the gospel, but even Saul's attempts to stop it, the spread of the gospel, help it to spread. It says that Saul was ravaging the church. He was being destructive against these people. And it's very clear when you look at what happens. It says he's entering house after house. He's dragging off men and women and committing them to prison. This is really bad. This is great persecution that they're facing. But we're going to see in the verses that follow that God uses this to allow the gospel to spread all over. And even in verse 1 here, where it says that they were scattered through the regions of Judea and Samaria, that's exactly what Christ said. And I think the wording there is significant, that it's pointed out that exactly what Christ said would happen is happening because God's power is at work. And there's nothing that anyone can do to stop it. God is empowering his mission for the church. About 88 and a half years ago, in 1932, there was a baby girl born. She had the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck, so it appeared that she was not breathing, she wasn't gonna survive, and her mother needed care, so the doctor focused on her and caring for her mother while the midwife and others worked with the baby. But God chose to allow that baby to be spared. Her circulation returned, she was able to grow up, and have a life of serving the Lord. And I actually spoke with that lady this morning to ask her permission to share this story. And she has shared that with me in the past as my grandmother. She had shared that story with me in the past to point out that God sovereignly works in all circumstances. When it looks like there's nothing humanly that can be done, God can still accomplish His plan. And I wouldn't be here today talking to you about this passage if God had not allowed her to survive through that birth. But God chose to do that, and he sovereignly planned that, so that each of us would be in the place that we are today to be able to look at this passage together. And I'm sure as you think about your life and the circumstances that God has placed you in, you can think of circumstances that if they had gone a different way would have impacted life in a huge and significant way for you. But God sovereignly works in the circumstances that we face to bring about his plan and his mission for the church. So if God has brought you here today to look at this passage together, He has something for you to learn. He has something for you to do because of what you hear. God is sovereignly working in these circumstances. God worked in the early church and sent them everywhere, spreading the gospel. And God has a plan for us too, all of us in this room, to be spreading the gospel and sharing it with those around us. Think about even in Galatians 4, 4 and 5, it talks about that when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who are under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. God waited until the perfect time. We can note certain things about that time. You think about the Roman Empire, the infrastructure that was built for the roads that these Christians would travel on when they were scattered from Jerusalem. We can think about the precision of the Greek language that God allowed his word to be written in, and then from that, translations have been made that we can read and understand God's word. But just each of those aspects that God chose at that time that the Savior would come then point us back to the fact that God sovereignly controls circumstances. So maybe even as you think about today, July 4th, a holiday that we celebrate in our country because of the freedoms that we have. God sovereignly allowed history to unfold as he did. So even as we think about celebrating something about our country, we should think about how God has sovereignly allowed those circumstances to unfold so that we are here in this moment with an opportunity to fulfill his mission. Think about the circumstances that you are in during the week. Who do you work with? What neighborhood do you live in? Where do you go to school? Probably you're out for the summer, but where do you go to school? Who do you interact with on a daily basis at the grocery store or the barbershop? or the doctor's office. What about these different places that God has put you, the circumstances that he has placed you sovereignly in? Perhaps you even have health challenges that have had you go recurringly to a particular doctor. You have opportunities with those people to be able to share the gospel. Maybe not every time you see them go through the whole gospel, but the way that you live, the things that you talk about as the door opens to that, as you pray for opportunities, God uses circumstances to allow the spread and to facilitate the spread of his word through his power. And we need to be looking for those circumstances, not just to rejoice in them on their own, but to use them as God has called us to, to share the gospel and to spread it with others. So as we look at these verses, we're going to see that God doesn't just use circumstances in our lives. That's one thing, but those can be confusing if we don't have more to guide us. We might think, based on circumstances, that every single person we see every day, we need to share the entire gospel with at that moment. But God uses other things to help us and to guide us, to know how to share the gospel, and when, and what to use, and what kind of places God has put us. So God also empowers His mission by His Spirit. And I do want to point something out really quickly before we go further, that as I'm outlining this story, It is a story, so it's not that these verses are the only verses that talk about God empowering His mission by His Spirit. It's going to continue into the next section as well, so I don't want to ignore that. And also, it says that they're preaching God's Word, and that's going to be the next main point, because the Ethiopian eunuch looks at Isaiah 53 to understand how he needs the Gospel. All I'm saying is that there's a particular emphasis on the Spirit's work in this section, and then a particular emphasis on God's Word as the Spirit uses it in the next section. So I don't want you to think that there's only certain ideas in each section. God is weaving this story. It's a narrative for us all to see how God is working through His Spirit. So in verses 4 to 25, we can see God empowering His mission for the church through His Spirit. It starts out in verses four through eight as the Holy Spirit opens the hearts of those who hear. And this is really important that we recognize that this is the work that the Holy Spirit has to do. It says that, now those who were scattered went about preaching the word. Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed to them the Christ. And the crowds with one accord paid attention to what was being said by Philip when they heard him and saw the signs that he did. This was through the power of the Holy Spirit. For unclean spirits, crying out with a loud voice, came out of many who had them, and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed. So there was much joy in that city." Now we don't see in this section that people are accepting Christ. They're not necessarily wholesale accepting the gospel yet. But this is preparing the way for what we're going to see in the next section of how people start to believe the gospel. So as we think about sharing the gospel with others, we have to know that there is a work going on inside that person's heart as we talk to them about the gospel. If God is not working in their heart, there's no chance that they're going to accept the gospel and the truths there. The Bible is very clear that we are all sinners, and that on our own we don't seek after God. God has to do that work, but don't be discouraged. The Holy Spirit does that work, and that's what's very clear in this passage, is that He is using these things that Philip is doing, He's empowering him to do that. And we're not going to take the time to get into miracles and when those happen and when those don't happen, although it's clear as the book of Acts progresses and closes that God was using those as a special means of communicating his servants, of showing who his servants were and where the truth was. but the Holy Spirit still empowers and opens the hearts of people. He may not do it through the healing of sick people or that kind of thing in our era, but he does open hearts to the gospel. And I think that's the principle that we can very clearly take away from this, is that God is working through his Holy Spirit to empower the spread of the gospel, to open people's hearts to what is going on. And then it says at the end, so there was much joy in that city, The joy wasn't over salvation yet. The joy here in that city was over the work that God was doing to show care for these people, that they were being healed, and that those people that were paralyzed were healed, and the lame were healed. So, and the unclean spirits were coming out. These things were to demonstrate that God is truly communicating through his servant, Philip, and that these people can listen to what he says. And we're going to get into that a little bit more as we look at the next section and see the powers of another man compared against what Philip was doing. If we look at verses 9 through 13, we can see that the Holy Spirit also transforms hearts. It's not just that He opens hearts to the Gospel, but He does the actual work of transformation too. And this should be encouraging to us, that we don't have to do this. We can depend on God's Spirit to do this work. So it says in verses 9-13, But there was a man named Simon who had previously practiced magic in the city and amazed the people of Samaria, saying that he himself was somebody great. They all paid attention to him from the least to the greatest, saying, This man is the power of God that is called Great. And they paid attention to him because for a long time he had amazed them with his magic. But when they believed Philip as he preached the good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. Even Simon himself believed, and after being baptized he continued with Philip. And seeing signs and great miracles performed, he was amazed. So there was this man who was a magician of sorts, most likely he had satanic power that was given to him to be able to get all of these people focused on him, but some sort of power that he demonstrated in order to attract attention. And you can tell that it can't be something that was good because it says in verse 9 at the end of it that he himself was somebody great. He was seeking people's attention and possibly even their worship. They were comparing him saying that he had the power of God that is called great. He was drawing all this attention to himself, and it sounds like it wasn't even just right in that area, but people from all over, from the least to the greatest, knew about him. So he was very well known in this area, and he was seeking all of this attention so that people would focus on him and his greatness. He wasn't pointing people to God. But Philip, in contrast, as he's preaching the gospel, there is a transformation that happens in the people. So think about this. Think about how hard it would be if you had seen all of these magical things that you couldn't explain, this great power working, and you were really excited about it. And then someone else comes along. Think about how hard it would be for you to change your perspective from liking what this one person was doing that seemed powerful, that seemed great, to this other person who's doing these signs. It's not an easy change. There obviously had to be work of the Holy Spirit going on for that change to take place. You've got miracles on both sides, which seems unexplained. So God was obviously working, and he was even working in the heart of Simon, that he would recognize that there was a difference with what Philip had to offer, that it wasn't just this power, but it was actually a life transformation. It wasn't just people's attention that came to him. Now we're going to see a little bit later on that Simon actually didn't get it all the way, and there's some question as to whether he did in the end or not. But he changed his perspective initially to see that what Philip was bringing was actually greater than what he had experienced. So the Holy Spirit is working to transform these hearts completely from one side, where they're following this man who does these magical things, or these great and amazing things, where they're almost worshiping him, to another man comes into town with similar kinds of miracles that he's performing, and they turn to him and realize that he has the truth. God's Holy Spirit is working in their hearts. So God transforms their hearts, and then he also judges hearts. So look at verses 14 through 25, where we see the story of what's going to come when the apostles from Jerusalem actually come. Now when the Apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit, for he had not yet fallen on any of them, but they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit. Now before we go too much further, we have a couple of things to address here. A few things that you might have questions about as you think about what we believe, what you have been taught from Scripture about how you receive the Holy Spirit, when you receive the Holy Spirit, how does that work. There's a little bit of confusion that might arise if we don't take into account all of scripture on how this works, but you notice that the people have been baptized, they believed in Christ, but they don't have the Holy Spirit in their hearts yet. And as you think about what scripture says later on, it's clear that when you trust in Christ, you get the Holy Spirit, and you don't get more of the Holy Spirit later. Scripture talks about being filled with the Spirit, but that's not talking about a change of amount, that's talking about influence, that the Holy Spirit influences you in a particular way. As we look at Acts 10, we're going to see another step in this process, but God, it appears from what we can understand as Acts progresses, that God chose to wait on giving the Holy Spirit for a couple of purposes. So for one thing, it clarified that he was actually working in the lives of these Samaritans. So the apostles come, And they put their stamp of approval. So perhaps people might not have thought of what Philip said as really happening. That, well, maybe he saw something or thought he saw something, but it wasn't really conversion that was going on. Because Philip was not one of the apostles. But the apostles came down from Jerusalem, and God used the pouring out of his Holy Spirit to signify that he was actually at work, that he had done the work of conversion in these people's hearts. Also, it was something for the apostles to see, because God was continuing to spread his word. The change wasn't just happening in Jerusalem, it's starting to spread outside of the people of Israel, And God is pointing out that he is putting his stamp of approval on the work that has been done there. It's not just that these people are saying they believe in Christ, but the Holy Spirit has come on them and the apostles can see that God is spreading his work to the Gentiles. As you think about the fact that there's a very clear distinction here that the Holy Spirit doesn't come right away when these people trust in Christ, I don't want that to be a confusing point as we move forward talking about what happens in this story. So they lay their hands on him, on these people, and they receive the Holy Spirit. But there's something that comes up with Simon. It's a little bit of a, maybe something we wouldn't expect, although there's a few hints to it from a few verses back. But Simon says, it says, Now think about this for a second. Why would you offer to pay for this power? What is the reason for that? And I think if we look back at what Simon had done before in verse 9, talking about saying that he himself was somebody great, it's clear that there's still something going on in his heart, that he has not fully given up his desire for others to look at him as someone great. And it's interesting too, that he's not asking Philip about this, he's asking the apostles for this power. So he wants to be equal with the apostles in the church, and that's a problem. You're going to see, following this now, it says, The statement here is like a curse that is being placed on him. This is really serious. This is not just, you had a bad idea, you shouldn't have done that. This is really serious. And he says, Also, he says, you have neither part nor lot in this matter, for your heart is not right before God. Repent therefore of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord that, if possible, the intent of your heart may be forgiven you. So this is really serious stuff. He's uttering this curse against Simon that if he does not repent, and it's not even something that he can do on his own, he needs to ask for God's help to repent, to be able to have the right response in this circumstance so that his heart turns back to the way that it should be. So it's very serious. If we look back at verse 13, we can see a little bit of a hint of some concerns that we might have about Simon. It says that even Simon himself believed, and after being baptized he continued with Philip. So he's very close to Philip, it's like he's wanting to observe these things. And it's interesting that the author points this out, because a lot of people were converted, but Simon is just really closely attached to Philip. He's right where the action is. So it seems like he's very focused still on being at the center of where the attention is. And then it says, when he sees signs and great miracles performed, he was amazed. So it's no longer that, you know, it says that he already believed to some extent, he believed that it was true at least, but he was interested in the miracles, not necessarily in the power of God that had changed his life. And so this is something that we have to be careful with as we share the gospel, as we communicate that to others, is that we don't always know when someone believes or puts their trust out on the outside if they actually know Christ as their Savior. That doesn't mean that we doubt and we continually question them over and over again to see if they know Christ or not. It just is something that we need to be aware of so that when we look at passages like the parable of the soils where Christ talks about certain people hearing the gospel and it appears that there's fruit, but then it stops, that we recognize that sometimes There are people who look like they have trusted in Christ, but it doesn't bear fruit long term, and you can see that it was not a true conversion. Probably the most important thing to remember about that is not to be discouraged as you see people doing that. We want to pursue people and seek to continue to share the gospel with them, but don't start to doubt whether you know Christ just because you see someone else turning away from Him. That's been a recent occurrence that we've seen a lot of. I think people use different terms for it, but we see articles about people who have trusted in Christ, perhaps they were this popular person, and then they're publicly saying, I don't believe in Christ anymore, I'm rejecting my childhood, or that kind of thing. That doesn't mean that they were saved, and now they're unsaved. That means that they believed, they maybe believed something was true, but they didn't really have God's work in their heart. God had not changed them. That's not to make you fear. Perhaps you're here today, and you haven't trusted in Christ as your Savior. That's not to make you fear, well, do I really mean it? Do I really understand what it means? If you recognize that you're a sinner, and that Christ is the only one who can save you from that, that He came to die on the cross to pay for your sins, That is what you have to believe. And if you understand those things, that you are a sinner and that you need Christ, that He's the only way, and you cast yourself on Him saying, will you save me? I'm a sinner. Then you can be confident that God is working in your heart and that He will save you. There are lots of scriptures that speak of that, that no one can pluck us out of the Father's hand. So we need to be careful as we look at this that we don't become concerned, but also that we have the right attitude as we think through what is an appropriate way to look at trusting in Christ and believing what that means. So Peter says to him, this curse, and Simon has to respond. Peter continues, he says, for I see that you're in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity. And Simon answered, pray for me to the Lord that nothing of what you have said may come upon me. So that's the last thing we hear from Simon. There's some discussions about church history and whether Simon turns up somewhere else in that, but we can't be confident in those cases because they're not part of scripture. But that's the last thing that we hear about Simon. And so He seems to respond asking that God will prevent these things from coming on him, but it's not clear whether he actually truly is repentant and truly desires salvation. So that's something to be careful of, that as we share the gospel that we're clear that this is not about getting prestige or getting power. But accepting Christ is about admitting that you are in desperate need of a Savior and that He's the only one who can do that. And God's power works and accomplishes that in the lives of many people. And we can see that as we look into Scripture. So the Holy Spirit judges hearts and differentiates between those who are truly believing in Him, believing in Christ, and those who are not. And so we need to be careful that if we have doubts about whether we are truly believing and trusting in Christ, that we work through that, that maybe you talk with someone about that and really understand, do you know Christ? Have you trusted in Him? Is your faith in Him? So the Holy Spirit also judges hearts. God accomplishes His mission by His Spirit. As we think about how God accomplishes His mission by His Spirit, sometimes we might think, when we're sharing the Gospel, we might think that we are the ones that have to do the work of sharing the Gospel. And as I was thinking about that, I've been reading a lot of children's stories lately, And so a particular children's story came to mind. There are these books about two animals. One is a frog and one is a toad. We affectionately refer to them as frog and toad stories. And there's a particular one where some seeds are planted. So Toad goes over to Frog's house, and he's got some really nice flowers. And so Frog, being a good friend, gives him some seeds. Says, go to your house, plant the seeds, and they'll come up. Well, Toad thinks, I've got to do all these things to get these seeds to grow. So he plants them, and they don't grow. And he starts yelling at them. And he says, you need to start growing. And he starts yelling, grow, grow, grow. And nothing happens. And so then he reads stories to them. He also sings songs to them. He reads poetry to them, and he plays music on his violin for them. And eventually, they finally pop out of the ground after several days. And he's really excited, and he goes to his friend Frog and says, the flowers, they're growing. It's so great. But you were right. It was a lot of hard work. So he is convinced that all of these things that he has done have helped these seeds to grow. But scripture teaches us that when we depend on the Holy Spirit, it's not these works that we have to do to get fruit in sharing the gospel. It's very clear from 1 Corinthians 3, 5-7, Paul says, What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each. I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. So as we share the gospel, which is our privilege that we need to be diligently Doing? We should be working hard at doing it, but it's never because of our hard work that anyone trusts in Christ or that we have the opportunity to see growth or fruit in someone's life. It's because the Holy Spirit is working and God is empowering his mission through the work of the Holy Spirit. So as you have opportunities to share the gospel, perhaps with neighbors, or as you pray for opportunities to meet people, maybe you don't know a lot of unbelievers at this very moment, as you have opportunities to share the gospel, don't get discouraged when you don't see fruit right away. And don't think that you have to come up with some different plan than God's plan of sharing his word and prayer, asking his spirit to work. God is the one who brings fruit, and we need to trust him to do that. And it's very clear in this passage that God is using his Holy Spirit to bring the fruit at the right time, and it doesn't happen in everyone's life. It appears that Simon doesn't continue We don't know for sure, but at least at that moment, Philip could be confident that there's a question mark, at least over one of the people who appear to trust in Christ. We don't have to worry about that. It's not our job to fix that. We need to trust God. We need to share his word, share the gospel, and then trust him to produce the fruit that will come because he's promised. I'm going to give you power. I'm going to empower my work. and He does it through His Holy Spirit. So, we can be confident that God is using circumstances to provide us opportunities to share the Gospel, to provide opportunities for the Gospel to spread, and that it will spread by His power. We can be confident that He uses His Holy Spirit to accomplish this work. And then last of all, we can see that God empowers His mission by His Spirit, by using His Word, And so as we look at verses 26 through 40, this is probably a pretty familiar story if you grew up going to Sunday school and have heard this before. If not, we're going to read through it. But God is going to work through his word, through Old Testament scripture, to make the gospel clear. So God empowers his mission by his word, and as I said, the Holy Spirit doesn't leave the scene at this point. He continues to work, but he works through his word, specifically the written word that this Ethiopian eunuch has in his hands. So he uses the reading of the word to transform this man's thinking. In verse 25, before we move on, it says that, Now when they had testified and spoken the word of the Lord, they returned to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel to many villages of the Samaritans. So the apostles responded, as they saw the Holy Spirit's work, it's clear that God was using that to help them see that God was working among the Gentiles because as they returned to Jerusalem, they preached the gospel all the way back. So God is empowering this mission through the work that he did through Philip, through what they saw at the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and now God is spreading his word all the way back to Jerusalem as they return. So it says in verse 26, an angel of the Lord said to Philip, rise and go toward the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. This is a desert place. And he rose and went. And there was an Ethiopian, a eunuch, a court official of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who was in charge of all of her treasure. He had come to Jerusalem to worship and was returning seated in his chariot. And he was reading the prophet Isaiah. And the Spirit said to Philip, Go over and join this chariot. So Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, Do you understand what you are reading? And he said, How can I, unless someone guides me? And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him. Now the passage of the scripture that he was reading was this, Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb before its shearer is silent, so he opens not his mouth. In his humiliation, justice was denied him. Who can describe his generation? For his life is taken away from the earth." We know this passage is Isaiah 53, and this Ethiopian eunuch had gotten a hold of this copy of the scriptures that he was bringing with him and reading. And what's amazing to me is that God could have used his Holy Spirit just to open this man's eyes as he read scripture. Sometimes that happens. Sometimes people will pick up a copy of the scripture and God uses that to communicate his word. But in this case, God specifically takes a man way out of his way to go and talk to this man about the scripture. And it's amazing to me how God has used people. He continues to choose to use us, broken vessels, to communicate his word. We are the people that he's chosen to do this. And so, Ethiopian eunuch, and this man is very clearly religious, he's come to Jerusalem to worship, so he already has some background in what's going on from the perspective of the Old Testament, but he's confused as to what this means in Isaiah 53. What is it talking about? And so Philip hears him reading it and offers to help him understand it. And the eunuch takes that offer up and is very excited. So God has used his word to help this man have questions to understand the gospel, and God continues to do that today as we have opportunity to talk with others. So sometimes I think it's easy to get the idea that in our culture we have to talk first. and we have to explain things to someone so that they will be able to understand the gospel. And sometimes we do need to do that. We need to give them context. We need to help them understand, because some people, as you talk with them, they won't have any background with scripture or the truths of what is in the Bible, and so we need to do that. But sometimes God uses his word first. So we need to be ready to recognize that when it happens, and God uses his word in people's hearts, that we will be ready to answer their questions. So we need to be students of God's Word that we understand or if someone asks us a question we don't know, go and study it out and be prepared to talk with these people about His Word and see how God uses that. I think as I have a temptation as I think about things logically and have discussions with people to forget about the significance of God's Word. So it's not that I mean, we know that God's Word is necessary to work in people's hearts, but sometimes we can get into discussions or arguments, perhaps, and forget the fact that God's Word has a purpose. Paul says it is a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ. The law that is in the Old Testament is a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ. God uses his Word, and it didn't stop back before the time of Christ, that God used his word up to a certain point, and then Christ came, and now we just give logical arguments to convince people that Christ is the Savior. God continues to use his word. It's clear that in the early church, God is continuing to use his word to spread the gospel. So as you have opportunities to share the gospel, use tools. Use tracks, use arguments or things that perhaps you've heard that might help people understand the gospel better, but don't neglect God's word because it still works in people's hearts. The Holy Spirit uses his word to communicate the gospel so that we have opportunity to explain what Christ was doing. And we're going to see that in a second as we look through the next few verses that God also uses the speaking of his word. So he uses the reading of his word, but he's also going to use the speaking of it as well on Philip's part. So it says, And the eunuch said to Philip, About whom, I ask you, does the prophet say this? About himself or about someone else? Then Philip opened his mouth, and beginning with this scripture, so he starts where the man was, He told him the good news about Jesus. So he doesn't just stay here and focus only on this scripture, but he goes through all of what Christ did and shares the gospel with this man based on this passage. So God uses this passage where we might say that it talks a little bit about the Messiah, and then Philip continues to fill the man in on what Christ has done for him and the good news about Jesus. And then it says, as they were going along the road, they came to some water, and the eunuch said, see, here is water. What prevents me from being baptized? And if you're really observant, and you can see really small numbers very well, and you're reading from an ESV, you might notice that the verse numbers went from 36 to 38. And you have a little note there at the end of verse 36, and it probably goes down to the bottom and says, some manuscripts add all or most of verse 37. It says, And Philip said, If you believe with all your heart, you may. And he replied, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. So we have a little bit of a question as to whether this verse at the bottom was part of the original manuscript. And just a really brief note on manuscripts, sometimes as things are written, the scribes might add things to make things more clear because they know truth from other scripture. So perhaps to not confuse people and make them think, well, he's heard the gospel, now he can just be baptized without accepting Christ, we'll add a little note here about what we think Philip probably said. That's a possibility here. Or it's possible that that verse was there in the original manuscripts and it, over time, as it was copied, got left out. I'm sure that all of you who have worked with a computer trying to type things without actually using physical copy-paste function have noticed that it's easy to mess things up or to make errors. But one of the things that we have confidence as we look at scripture is that nothing that is significant to our belief in Christ is left out of our copy of the scriptures. We can be confident that God's word has been preserved. So if verse 37 is not part of the original, can we still be okay? Can we still understand that salvation has to come before baptism? Well, yes. There's nothing here that says he didn't believe, and there's nothing here that says that baptism was part of his salvation. There are plenty of other scriptures that make it clear that we trust in Christ for salvation, that's a done deal at the point that we trust in Christ, and then baptism happens later as an act of obedience. Whether the verse is there or not, the truth is there that this man must have trusted in Christ, and I'm sure Philip would not have baptized him if he didn't know that he had trusted in Christ. So I just wanted to note that quickly so you didn't think, well, can I believe what the Bible says clearly, that I have everything here that I need? Yes, we can be confident that whether the manuscript had that verse or not, the original that was written, nothing changed in our belief about Christ or how salvation works. So just a note there very quickly. So then it says, It's really interesting that note, tying in with joy, being in the city before, and now rejoicing because salvation has come. But Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he passed through, he preached the gospel to all the towns until he came to Caesarea." So think about this. This is the key note that we see through all of chapter 8. People went places preaching the gospel over and over again, and God is the one who is empowering this movement. He's using circumstances, He's using His Spirit, He's using His Word, all woven together to give opportunities to share the Gospel. So as we think about that and think about how we are to respond, I think this is an important thing to think about with what God has done with His Word. I'm sure many of you have heard of William Tyndale. He was executed for trying to translate the scriptures into English and spread them. But William Tyndale said this to a clergyman a little bit before he was executed. He said, if God spare my life, ere many years, I will cause the boy that driveth the plow to know more of the scriptures than thou dost. Now, obviously that's not going to come across very favorably to the clergyman who's hearing this. He was pretty upset by that. But Tyndale's point is this, that the people who read it and God works through it, is a powerful thing. It is the only thing that will change hearts. As the Holy Spirit works through His Word, it is what is necessary to spread the gospel and to spread truth. And so as we have opportunities to share the gospel, as God has placed you in the circumstances that He has for His purpose, You can have confidence that as you look at those circumstances, those were sovereignly ordained. There is no accident in any part of your life. Every single thing that occurs, God is in complete control of and he has a purpose for it. And his purpose is that his mission go forward. His mission of spreading the gospel and of sharing the truth that Jesus saves, that Christ is sufficient, that he's all we need. And he accomplishes that through his spirit. We can depend on his spirit. We don't have to be concerned about the results. We do what is right. We do what God has called us to, and God will empower that work. And then we use his word as the tool that he has given to us in order to share the gospel. And as we do those things, we can be confident that our church is accomplishing the mission, not because we're great, not because we're the most spiritual people in the world, or because we have anything special about us, but because we serve a great God, and God's mission will not be stopped. God empowers His mission in the church, and we can be confident of that as we look at these stories in the book of Acts, as we look at Acts 8, and stories going forward, that God is going to accomplish that mission.